Man Boobs and We're Moving!

How do men know when their man boobs have become too big?

When their 2 ½ year old daughter holds her mummy’s bra up against Daddy’s bare chest and says, ‘Boobies!’

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When does 5-3=5?

When Boywonder holds up five fingers on one hand and three fingers on the other and says, ‘Five take away three,’ before removing the hand with three fingers and announcing the answer is five.

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This is the last post on this blog. All future posts will be on http://finding-my-star.blogspot.com.au/

Finding My Star reveals the journey that my family embarked on when I first fell ill two years ago. From the frustration of misdiagnoses to acceptance and adjustment, it includes the challenges we were forced to face, the changes we made, recipes and the effect it had on my views in life.

It will still incorporate the humorous side of our lives – thankfully, that hasn’t changed!

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Chilli Anyone…Again!

After Boywonder and Tomboy’s run-in with chilli, I discovered how much pain one tiny speck of chilli juice can cause. I lost a lot of chillies to some fiendish grub, so a friend, whose chilli bush thrived this summer, offered me quite a few of their chillies.

There were far too many chillies to use before they went off, so I decided to slice them up and freeze them ready for future cooking. I was halfway through the slicing when a tiny speck of chilli juice flicked straight into my eye.

My first reaction was to close my eyes and touch them with my hands. Luckily, I stopped myself before I thrust my chilli-covered hands onto my eyes. I could feel the burning sensation in my eye immediately. What was worse, that tiny speck of chilli juice was mixing with the fluid in my eyes – the heat was spreading across my eyeball like wildfire.

Helpless without the use of my chilli-covered hands, I called Mr T to help rinse my eyes. The more my eyes watered from the burning, the more the burning spread. Mr T grabbed a face washer from the drawer and wet it with water, but that did no good.

Then Mr T remembered milk and we splashed that onto the face washer. It was useless trying to get the milk into my eye as I couldn’t open it long enough due to the pain, and if I did get it open, I couldn't stop the reflex to close it when the milk got near it, so I held the milk-soaked face washer to my eye.

Each time I took the face washer away to see if the burning was gone, it returned even stronger and had continued to spread. My eye felt like it was on fire beneath my eyelid and on the skin all around my eye. It had even spread to my nose as it watered furiously.

Half and hour later I eased the face washer off my eye and was relieved to find the fire was out. I returned to slicing up the chillies, but decided to wear my glasses while I did it.

And just in case I hadn’t learnt my lesson, an hour after I’d finished cutting up the chillies, my hands started to feel like they were on fire. The more I tried to get rid of it, the worse they felt.

A quick Google search revealed salt, alcohol and mayonnaise as possible ways to relieve it. They all worked while I was doing it, but as soon as I washed my hands off, they felt even hotter.

In the end I took some painkillers and went to bed. The heat was gone by the morning, but two days later, as soon as I used my hands a lot, the burning sensation returned to my fingertips.

So now I wear glasses and gloves when cutting up chillies. 

The Stinky Boy

Tomboy enjoyed her first couple of days of school, but had a major complaint at the end of the second day.

I asked her how the day went and she declared, ‘There is a very stinky boy in my class!’

‘Was he farting a lot?’ I asked.

‘No.’

‘Had he pooed his pants?’

‘Noooo, he was just really stinky,’ she replied with obvious frustration at my inability to understand the ‘stink’.

‘Okay,’ I said. To avoid aggravating her further, I changed the subject to her upcoming birthday party and who we should invite.

Tomboy’s first request was, ‘Can you not invite the stinky boy?’

We’d delayed her birthday party so we could also use it as a way for Tomboy to bond with her new school friends. The boys outnumber the girls two to one, and I didn’t want her party being too big or dominated by a bunch of boisterous boys.

I explained that I was thinking of having a small party with only the girls from her class.

‘No, I want boys there too. Just don’t invite the stinky boy. He has too much stinkiness!’

We didn’t invite the stinky boy or any of the other boys. As originally planned, we invited the other five girls in Tomboy’s class and have booked a fairy to come and entertain the girls with games and face painting tomorrow.

She may still end up with a stinky boy at her party if her brother, Boywonder, and his butt are in fine form.

Leaking

Recent episodes of Home and Away were very sad for Junior Accountant and me when a main character we really liked died.

After watching the funeral, Junior Accountant said, ‘I did well, I only had one tear escape.’

Still sobbing, I turned to her and said, ‘Wait until you get older, it’s harder to keep them in.’

To which she replied, ‘What, like your wee?’

I had a few more tears after that, but at least they were from laughing so hard.

And no, I didn’t wet myself from laughing too hard!

Chilli Anyone?

The three youngest children enjoy helping me with our little veggie garden, but they also get bored quickly. Five minutes after accompanying me outside to stake my tomatoes and find a suitable pot for my new chilli bush, they disappeared back inside the house.

A short while later Boywonder came to the back door and told me his nose was burning. I didn’t doubt it, as his nose was so red he looked like Rudolph. He said that Tomboy’s top lip was also burning.

I made it very clear to him that they weren’t in trouble and that it was very important that he tell me what they’d put on their faces. The possible scenarios raced through my head. Had someone left the exit mould out after cleaning the bathroom and they’d sprayed it in their faces? Had they used something they’d mistakenly thought was sunscreen?

Boywonder was adamant that they hadn’t put anything on their faces. ‘All we did was smell the chilli,’ he explained.

‘You didn’t bite one did you?’ I asked.

‘No, you told us not to taste them because they were hot, so we only smelled that one,’ he said pointing at half a chilli on the ground near the chilli bush.

Just as they’d been told, they didn’t pull anything off of the bush (the offending chilli had fallen off when I was repotting the plant) and they didn’t taste the chilli.

And now they also know not to touch their faces with a chilli when smelling it.

They spent the rest of the afternoon walking around the house holding wet facewashers to their nose and top lip and I was pleased to know that we’d bought a chilli bush with some heat in it!

Only A Little Bit Fat!

Now that summer is here, Junior Accountant has decided to lose some excess weight.

As Junior Accountant set up the Wii Active, Boywonder, Tomboy and Miss Flora crowded around her asking questions about what sort of game she was going to play.

Junior Accountant – ‘It’s an exercise program to help make me thinner.’

Tomboy – ‘But you’re only a little bit fat.’

Junior Accountant – ‘Gee, thanks for that.’

Tomboy – ‘What? I’m only commentating.’

Tomboy’s commentary was soon forgotten as the three little ones busied themselves with some humorous attempts at imitating Junior Accountant’s exercises.

Fifteen minutes later Tomboy tilted her head to the side, looked Junior Accountant up and down, and declared, ‘I don’t think it’s working, you’re still not thin!’

When I Grow Up

On our way to school earlier this week, the kids started discussing what they wanted to be when they grew up.

Boywonder said that since he was so good at pulling his seatbelt out and across him to do it up that he would be good at making car seats and belts for cars.

Tomboy said that she was good at drawing so she would be an artist when she grew up.

I asked who was going to be a doctor.

With their professions already chosen, Tomboy and Boywonder nominated Miss Flora, to which Miss Flora responded with, ‘Nooo, I’m going to be a dog!’

It brought back memories of when The Apprentice was little and declared she was going to be a tree when she grew up. The interesting thing is that she’s studying conservation land management and horticulture…

Dumb and Dumber on Holiday

Mr T and I had a couple of “moments” during our last weekend in Traralgon. We stayed in a lovely spacious apartment that included a deep spa bath, a remote-controlled heating and cooling system in the lounge area, and a walk-in wardrobe in the main bedroom.

After sussing out each room and cupboard in the apartment we unpacked and Mr T hung his shirts so they didn’t get creased. Unfortunately, the more Mr T tried to keep his shirts from creasing, the more his forehead creased.

I found him having a great deal of trouble as he attempted to hang his shirts' coat hangers on the door handle of the walk-in wardrobe. The door handle was too close to the doorframe, thus preventing him from getting the hangers to sit over the handle properly.

‘What are you doing?’ I asked, rather confused as to why he was persisting with the door handle when he had a whole wardrobe on the other side of the door.

As he opened the door to the wardrobe in an attempt to hang the shirts and then close the door, he remembered what was on the other side of the door. ‘I could just hang them in there, couldn’t I,’ he said rather sheepishly.

It wasn’t long until Mr T decided to check out the spa bath. After a while I too went in the direction of the kids’ bedroom and the bathroom that contained the spa bath, only to be met by a loud rumbling sound.

‘What is that horrid noise?’ I asked.

‘It’s the spa bath, don’t worry, it’ll turn itself off soon,’ replied Mr T, thinking that it worked on a timer.

After ten minutes the sound didn’t stop and I went into the bathroom to where the “empty” spa bath sat, still desperately trying to circulate air and water through an empty bath tub. I became a little worried when I noticed a slight burning smell. I looked at the button Mr T had pushed to turn it on and went back to where he was in the bedroom and asked if he had tried to turn it off by pushing the button again.

‘No,’ said Mr T slowly as he thought about the merits of my suggestion, so I returned to the bathroom and pushed the button. The spa bath stopped.

Both are understandable gaffs when one is unfamiliar with the abode or its amenities, but there is no excuse for the dumb moment we shared on the first night.

We decided to turn the heating on when it became quite chilly during the evening. The instructions above the remote control on the wall said, ‘Pick up remote, turn it on, set temperature. There will be a delay before the system starts’.  It sounds pretty simple doesn’t it, and even more so when it was the standard wall-mounted system, like the one in this picture, which you can hear and feel when it’s on and working. Not for us!

We pushed the on button and the remote beeped. We set the temp and the remote beeped each time we went up or down a degree. We sat back down in front of the television and waited for the heating system on the farthest wall to start warming the place. After twenty minutes, I increased the temperature on the remote to 29C (84F) because the room temperature hadn’t changed at all.

After discussing how useless the heating system was, we concluded it must be because it was trying to heat a very large room. After another fifteen minutes, by which time I was wearing my large overcoat over my pyjamas and had a blanket wrapped around my legs and feet, I went to the remote and picked it up and increased the temperature by another five degrees. I moved closer to the heating system and noted how quiet it was – too quiet!

With the remote still in my hand I pushed the power button on the remote again – maybe turning it off and on again would help – and instead of the remote control beeping, this time the heating system beeped as well – and a light came on! It was at that point that we realised the heating system hadn’t been on at all because we hadn’t picked the remote up and pointed it in the direction of the heating system.

We took comfort in the fact that we were as dumb as each other when it came to figuring out the heating – or lack of it.

Why Do I Have White Hair?

I was sitting on the steps, watching Boywonder at Auskick while Tomboy stood on the step behind me, playing with my hair.

It was very relaxing until Tomboy said, ‘Why have you got white in your hair?’

I ignored her question, hoping she’d find something else back there – nits, fleas, ticks…

But it wasn’t to be.

Slightly louder this time: ‘Mummy, why is there white hair on your head?’

I was still hoping something – anything – would distract her when she asked with a shout, ‘Mummy, why do you have white hair?!’

Tomboy’s loud vocalisation about my grey roots in desperate need of some hair dye, not only confirmed I was going grey (not to mention deaf), but brought it to the attention of everyone within a ten-metre radius.

My reply: ‘Because I have too many kids!’

A couple of weeks later while seated at the computer waiting for the hair dye on my head to do its job, Tomboy asked me why I was dying my hair.

‘To get rid of the white hair,’ I replied.

‘Oh, you didn’t tell me you had white hair,’ she said before trotting off to play.

At least I’m not suffering memory problems!

Tomboy Takes Over the World!

While Mr T and Boywonder have been home sick with the flu this week, Tomboy and Miss Flora have been busy trying to take over the world.

When Mr T came downstairs after trying to have a nap, Tomboy asked, ‘Did you have a good sleep, Daddy?’

Mr T said, ‘I was until I heard a lot of banging downstairs.’

‘Ah, yes,’ replied Tomboy, ‘we were trying to take over the world.’

‘Well you woke me.’

‘Sorry about that,’ said Tomboy before running off to continue her appropriation of the world from the safety of our lounge room.

The Apprentice Quotes…

The Apprentice amuses us regularly with her unusual views and interesting comments.

When planning their trip to Port Douglas, The Apprentice’s Boyfriend (TAB) suggested that they do some snorkelling. The Apprentice responded with, ‘I don’t know, what if I get the bends?’

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While play fighting with Tomboy one evening, The Apprentice exclaimed, ‘You’re so strong; every muscle is muscle!’

As opposed to…?

****

We were all sad to hear that one of TAB’s racehorses fell ill, resulting in it going blind, but The Apprentice was optimistic when she asked, ‘Don’t they have like a Paralympics for horses?’

Kneepits and Flattered Sausages!

Boywonder has now completed six months of his first year in school. As he learnt new and exciting things at school each day, his attempts to apply his newly acquired knowledge to his everyday life often had humorous results.

Anatomy –

When encouraging the kids to wash themselves in the bath one night, I reminded Boywonder to wash under his armpits. A short while later he started to wash his legs and as he washed behind his knees, he said to me, ‘Don’t forget my kneepits!’

Geography –

We were on our way back to Melbourne (capital of Victoria in Australia) after spending a weekend in Traralgon (rural Victoria), when Boywonder woke from a short nap and asked, ‘Are we back in Australia yet?’

Food –

Boywonder must think he’s not the only one that enjoys a battered sausage from the local fish and chip shop. When we asked what he’d like to order for dinner, he replied, ‘A flattered sausage.’

Unfortunately, the last week of this exciting first six months wasn’t as amusing. As the novelty wore off, the work became harder and Boywonder realised school is not always about fun and games with his mates. He became extremely distressed when we arrived at school each day. Needing two teachers to prise my son’s hands from my arm was as distressing for me as it was for him. I was glad I had my sunnies on, so he couldn’t see my tears.

After much discussion, we discovered that he loved socialising with his many friends and wasn’t subjected to bullying. He loved playing with the noisy instruments in music, but didn’t like the dance that he couldn’t master. He loved picking a library book to bring home, but didn’t like creating the picture that one of his classmates always so kindly pointed out to him was wrong. He loved group reading with the other three kids that were on the same reading level as him, but hated the large group activity that he had trouble comprehending.

We soon realised that his confidence needed a boost. We also discovered that Boywonder believed that once you got something wrong, that was it, end of the line – a big, fat FAIL.

A week after his distress began, we managed to boost his confidence and help him understand that mistakes and practice are a major part of learning for everyone – young and old.  You can imagine my dismay when I collected him from school this afternoon and asked him if he was excited about it being school holidays and he replied with, ‘Ohhh, I want to go to school tomorrow!’

The Love Bug

A resurgence of the tummy bug in our home has reminded us that words are not the only way to say ‘I love you’.

This time The Apprentice was one of the hardest hit by the bug, experiencing projectile expulsion of noxious matter from both ends. Her insides were so twisted in pain and her woeful moaning so loud during the night that Mr T wasn’t sure if she was in pain or the throws of passion. Unfortunately for TAB (The Apprentice’s Boyfriend), he was staying at our place, so he became The Apprentice’s nurse for the night.

While Mr T and I spent the night changing Tomboy’s bed sheets and holding her hair back while she vomited, TAB did the same for The Apprentice. When The Apprentice was stuck on the toilet and a bucket didn’t arrive in time, TAB didn’t hesitate to mop up the resultant mess. He helped her to the shower, cleaned her up and then sought new sheets for their bed. Not once did I hear him complain.

He was even chivalrous about The Apprentice’s mishaps. When I saw him changing the bed sheets, I said, ‘Oh no, did she get the bed too?’

TAB said nothing. He just gave me a sad, but knowing look. Then The Apprentice said, ‘It just shot out my bum before I knew it was even coming.’

‘You shit the bed?!’ I exclaimed.

TAB continued to change the sheets, and then helped The Apprentice back into bed before climbing in next to her. If getting back into bed with someone after they’ve shit in it doesn’t say ‘I love you’, I don’t know what does.

Internal Organs

Once again we are under attack as another tummy bug barges into our home. (More on that in a later post.) It doesn’t seem to matter how many dirty nappies the children watch me change or how much vomit they ogle when one of their siblings heaves into a bucket, they have an obscene fascination for the waste products that leave our bodies.

Sometimes this fascination extends to our internal organs as well. While waiting to pay the bill after having a renal ultrasound one morning, Boywonder asked me why we were at a different doctor to where we usually go. I explained that the doctor needed to look at my kidneys and bladder.

‘Did he take them out and have a look? Can I look too?’ asked Boywonder as he grabbed my shirt, ready to lift it and look for himself.

After I explained that the doctor uses a special machine to see my kidneys and bladder, and it certainly doesn’t involve taking them out, Boywonder then asked,

‘What’s a bladder? Can I look at your bladder?’

I enlightened my budding anatomist by placing a little pressure on his bladder and asking him if it made him want to wee.

‘Yes,’ he said.

‘That’s your bladder!’

He was finally happy with these explanations. That was until I had to pick up another four-litre bottle so I could perform the 24-hour urine test again.

After we arrived home, Boywonder picked the bottle up and asked, ‘Do you have to wee in the bottle again, Mummy?’

‘Yes.’

‘Can I wee in it too?’

‘NO!’ I replied as I took the bottle from him.

‘But I have a bladder too!’ was Boywonder’s argument.

‘Everyone has a bladder, but they are not all going to be contributing to my bottle!’ I replied, hugging the bottle to my chest. I then hurried to the toilet with my bottle before Boywonder gave me the lecture on sharing that he’d heard so often from me.

Psychopathic…

The Apprentice and Uni Student took Tomboy and Boywonder to the shops in Uni Student’s car. They connected Uni Student’s iPod to the car stereo via bluetooth, thus enabling The Apprentice to change songs without touching the iPod.

After watching The Apprentice fast-forward to the songs that Tomboy requested, Boywonder asked The Apprentice how she was doing it. 

‘I’m psychopathic,’ she replied.

We assumed she was trying to say she was psychic and/or telepathic, but after this morning’s events we’ve since added psychotic to the meaning.

The Apprentice broke down on the way to TAFE during peak hour traffic. Her boyfriend (TAB – The Apprentice’s Boyfriend) was at work.

My first question was, of course, ‘Do you have roadside assistance?’

‘No, I'm not paying for that! TAB’s my roadside assistance.’

‘Have you called him?’

‘Yes, but he can’t make it!’

(She’s obviously not heard the saying – You get what you pay for!)

After dropping Boywonder at school I go and pick her up. In the meantime, Uni Student goes online and gets The Apprentice some roadside assistance. All the way home The Apprentice tells me that she didn’t want to join RACV roadside assistance, as she doesn’t like that they have a monopoly on it.

Hmmm, a company having a multitude of cars out on the road to quickly get to those who have broken down is a monopoly and, apparently, a bad thing.

Her alternative, and also her preferred choice, was to try to drive it home, but I wouldn’t let her do it. It involved driving her car, which wouldn’t accelerate faster than 20 km/h as it spluttered and threatened to conk out, across four lanes of the freeway with traffic bearing down on her at 100 km/h. She would then have to drive her car across the boggy grass area to cross another four lanes of the freeway (heading in the other direction), again with traffic bearing down on her at 100 km/h. If she managed the suicidal freeway crossing, she would then attempt to drive her car all the way home in the emergency lane at 20 km/h.

Psychotic…

Whose Poo?

Five nights out of seven, Tomboy gets the urge to evacuate her bowels mid-dinner. I don’t know if she’s making more room in her belly or just wants to escape the dinner table for a while, but it’s a regular occurrence. It wouldn’t be such a problem if she learned to wipe her own bum!

On this occasion she said she needed to ‘go to the toilet’ and left the table. Not long after she disappeared into the toilet (the room, not the actual toilet), she yelled out, ‘I found a poo!’

We thought that she had put off pooing because of her discovery, so I yelled back, ‘Whose poo?’

‘My poo!’ was her reply.

We’re not sure if it was a ‘surprise’ poo (the poo you don’t know about until it’s arrived) or if this was her first ever look in the toilet bowl after doing her business. She gets rather indignant when asked sensitive questions, especially if everyone’s attention is on her, awaiting a reply, so we left that one alone.

And just in case you’re wondering – I got to wipe her bum.

Mother's Day

My Mother’s Day started on Thursday with a special visit to the kindergarten with the other mums. We spent an hour being pampered and making princess things with our children. The mums got to be the princesses!

After Tomboy and I enjoyed decorating a portrait of myself as a princess, making a princess crown and reading a book together, we moved to the table that had fairy pillows on it. They were for me to rest my hands on while Tomboy gave me a hand massage with some hand moisturiser.

I asked Tomboy if she wanted my hands palms up or down and she turned them so they were palms up. She then stuck her finger in the tub of moisturising cream and dropped a big dollop in my right palm. She then got another rather large dollop and dropped it into my left palm.

Tomboy wasted no time spreading the cream about on my hands. Realising that she had quite a bit of cream on her own hands, she stopped spreading it about on mine and proceeded to rub her hands together.

Still sitting there with slathers of cream on each palm (there was enough to do my legs too), I reminded her about my hands.

‘Rub them together like this!’ she said as she continued to rub her hands together in a vain attempt to get rid of it.

And that was the end of my hand massage. 

The rest of our activities were a little hampered after that. Pulling tiny heart stickers off of a sticker sheet to stick on a plastic pot or threading small beads to make a princess bracelet is extremely challenging when performed with slippery hands. (The teacher had to tie my bracelet together!)

At least I have my wonderful portrait, drawn by Tomboy to remind me of how much fun we had together. 

Her talents are exceptional. See how well she’s captured my double chin. And that isn’t a line of pimples, it’s my diamond necklace and, no, she didn’t make me a ‘ranga’ with a mohawk, that’s an orange tiara. The blue eyeshadow was my idea, reminiscent of the eighties.

I’d love to say that Mother’s Day on Sunday was filled with self-indulgence, but I worked all day, while Mr T cleaned the house and kept the kids busy so I could get on with the job. I did, however, spend the day in my pyjamas (the benefits of working from home) and received some wonderful presents.

At least Boywonder didn’t declare the day his five minutes after I opened my presents – like he did last year.

http://becausemumsaid.blogspot.com/2010/05/mothers-day-or-is-that-boys-day.html

 

When Thinking Outside the Square Isn’t the Best Idea

I was doing the dishes when I heard The Apprentice banging about at the kitchen bench and then swear.

A quick investigation of the problem revealed that when she was trying to open a tin of catfood, the metal loop that you hook your finger through and pull had broken off. Well known for thinking ‘outside the square’, The Apprentice was using a teaspoon to try and prise the lid open. This might have worked if the loop had lifted the edge of the lid at all before it broke, but it hadn’t.

Lucky for The Apprentice I happened to have a new invention in the kitchen that would solve her problem within seconds. I pulled it out of the drawer and attached it to the top of the can. I then turned the handle so that it moved around the top of the can, miraculously lifting the top off as it went around.

I told The Apprentice that since this new invention opened the can, the ideal name would be a can opener.

Bad Words

Boywonder came home from school yesterday and told me – quite seriously – that one of his friends said a bad word, so he told the teacher.

‘What did he say?’ I asked.

‘F*cken headen [sic] – and – he said STUPID!’ replied Boywonder wide-eyed as he said stupid.

Boywonder thought ‘stupid’ was the most offending word that came out of his mouth. He knew the ‘F’ word was wrong, but he’d never tried it at home, so he’d only heard lectures from us about how rude it is to call other people stupid. In fact, when he hears us call an inanimate object stupid because it doesn’t work properly, he goes mad at us for saying ‘stupid’.

No doubt he will start using the ‘F’ word more often to get a reaction, since we had to explain to him that any words beginning with f*ck are the worst words and that we don’t ever want to hear him say them.

I’m not looking forward to when he first hears c*nt and we have to explain that it is worse than the ‘F’ word. Kids have an uncanny knack for remembering the parts of your conversations that you don’t want remembered.

‘But you said f*ck was the worst word!’

My Age – According to Tomboy!

Tomboy was standing on the other side of the backyard when she held up a piece of blue string that she’d found in the garden. ‘What’s this, Mummy?’ she asked me.

I am short-sighted, and thus, need glasses to see things clearly when they are far away.

‘I can’t see it properly, bring it here,’ I replied.

‘Can’t you see it because you’re old?’  asked Tomboy.

‘No,’ I replied, ‘it’s because I don’t have my glasses on!’

A few days later, The Apprentice informed me that Tomboy asked her if I had a boyfriend when I was younger. (They'd been discussing boyfriends.) To ensure The Apprentice understood what she meant by ‘when Mummy was younger’, Tomboy added, ‘When there was dinosaurs!’